Caffiene Withdrawls
by Sculla
Summary: It was early, too early in Clint's opinion. He just wanted his coffee, was that too much to ask?


**AN: A story I speed wrote a few months ago after seeing a prompt on the meme that I couldn't get out of my head. I just found it again on my laptop and I'd thought I'd post it just to send my followers of Family Ties into a tizzy when they see the update notification in their emails. I'm evil I know, but I'm blanking on Family Ties at the moment since it's grown much larger than anticipated and now requires an actual thought out plot. It may take a while but it will be updated eventually, hopefully one or two more chapters before Christmas anyway.**

**So enjoy the randomness below in the meantime.**

**And if someone gets the reference, Kudos!**

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Stumbling into the kitchen at the ungodly hour of three am, Clint slowly shuffled across the tiled floor toward the expensive coffee machine Tony had set up in the Tower community kitchen without bothering to turn on any of the lights. It was a monstrosity in the archer's opinion but it did however expel the sweet, sweet life giving liquid his body craved. Staring blearily at the machine he poked a finger haphazardly at the glowing buttons until it started making noises which he assumed meant that it was working.

He stood there staring at the machine sleepily for several long seconds before he realized that he would probably need a mug to put the coffee in. Grunting to himself, Clint turned and slid his socked feet across the tiles toward the cupboard containing said vessels and grabbed the closest one; it happened to be lime green with pictures of pink squids on it and Clint who had yet to wake up completely just took it as was but made a mental note to mock Natasha for her choice of mugs when he was better prepared to dodge. He shuffled back across the floor to place the mug beside the coffee machine before resting his forehead against the hanging cupboard and closing his eyes.

Curse Fury and Coulson for making him get up so early to go on the damned mission to Chechnya; why did HYRDA have to make a base of operations there? Why couldn't it be closer? Say the Chrysler building, it was just down the road and would take less than five minutes to get there. Clint would be able to get another four hours of much needed sleep then.

He had almost dozed off again in his standing position when the coffee machine let out a series of high pitched beeps and began spluttering out hot liquid. Yelping in pain as the hot water scalded his bare torso; Clint jumped back and almost ended up on his ass as his socked feet slipped on the tiles. He only managed to save himself from the fall by lunging out and grabbing the side of the bench. Pulling himself back onto his feet, Clint glared at the distressed sounding coffee machine and wiped the water droplets off his chest, wincing slightly as his calloused fingers brushed against the tiny burns. Clint was pretty sure the coffee machine wasn't supposed to do that; well at least it hadn't done that the last time he used it. He eyed it suspiciously when it continued to not make the glorious coffee but beep incessantly instead. Sighing, Clint reached forward warily and hit the switch on the wall sending the flashing and beeping machine into silence. "Fuck." He grumbled under his breath when he realized that he wouldn't be getting his morning coffee from there.

He ran his hands through his short hair in distress. He needed his morning coffee; he'd been told by several people, most notably Coulson, that he wasn't even remotely human if he hadn't had his coffee. _Natasha_ even avoided him on the rare days he didn't have his morning brew. "Okay, think." He muttered under his breath as he tried to recall the locations of any other coffee machines in the Tower. He knew Nat had one, but he wasn't caffeine deprived enough sneak into her room and use the kitchenette. Bruce didn't drink coffee, crazy but understandable due to the Other Guy. Thor had broken his last week when he had pressed a couple of buttons too hard and poked them into the machine and it was yet to be replaced, much like Clint's whose may or may not have an arrow sticking out of it. Steve was a weirdo and had converted the kitchen area into an art studio and thus used the communal kitchen and its coffee machine which had just died; which meant Tony. The billionaire had a coffee machine in his lab because he used the brown liquid like life blood much the same as Clint but unfortunately the archer didn't have access to said lab. He could probably sneak in through the vents, but in his caffeine deprived state he'd probably end up in Natasha's room instead. That left Tony's suite…which the billionaire was currently sleeping in. "Son of a bitch." Clint grumbled under his breath, shoulders slumping in defeat. They weren't supposed to wake Tony up if he was sleeping in his rooms; Bruce had made the mistake of doing that once and the resulting lecture he received from Pepper for waking Tony even scared the Hulk into meekly retreating away from the petite redhead. So Tony's coffee machine was out of bounds too.

"Goddamned son of a drooling whore and a monkey!" Clint snapped yanking his hands away from his head and slapping them onto the marble bench top in frustration. He needed coffee and he needed it now! Despite New York being the city that never sleeps, coffee shops weren't actually open twenty four seven and besides even if one were open Clint had been banned from all of them within a twenty block radius around the tower. Ten of which were unjust in his opinion; it wasn't his fault that Doombots or aliens came crashing in through the windows when he had gone for lunch.

Okay, there had to be coffee somewhere in this tower. Clint recalled Steve proudly carrying in a large tin of instant one time and gushing over how you could buy it in bulk nowadays. Clint was pretty sure that if Natasha hadn't ripped it out of his hands and slammed it into the back of one of the cupboards with a dark look then Tony would have done it as he berated the super soldier on the cons of the Dreaded Instant Devil Brew. It was a last resort but Clint was desperate and a second later he found himself digging through the cupboards trying to locate the tin.

He let out a shout of triumph that was mixed with a hint of horror when he found it hidden underneath a half empty box of fiber grain thing from one of Bruce's attempts at getting the team to eat healthy six months ago and what he assumed used to be a loaf of bread but now looked like a baby of the alien they had fought last week. Pulling the tin out and placing it on the bench, Clint grabbed a teaspoon out of the drawer and popped the lid. The smell of coffee emanated from the tin and Clint let out a whimper at the aroma; it wasn't up to the standards of his usual but by God did it smell good.

He heaped several teaspoons into the mug; due to it being instant he was pretty sure that it wasn't going to have as much caffeine in it so he quadrupled it just in case, and then added some hot water that was still slowly leaking out of the coffee machine that was in its death throes. Stirring it, he watched as the flakes of instant coffee slowly turned the hot water dark brown and grinned to himself before raising the mug to take a much needed mouthful.

"What are you doing?!"

Clint jumped about a mile into the air at the shout from the doorway and he spun around, coffee sloshing out of the cup, to see Tony staring at him in horror.

"What?" he asked dumbly after his heartbeat had stopped rabbiting in his chest.

"Is that…_instant_?" Tony asked in a mixture of derision and dismay.

Clint looked from the billionaire to the now half empty mug and found himself curling his hands around the remaining precious liquid protectively. "It's coffee." He retorted defensively. "Crappy coffee but coffee, and I _need_ coffee. The machine broke."

"It's instant."

"Coffee."

"_Instant_."

"_Coffee._"

"_Instant!"_

"_Coffee!"_

"Barton," Tony growled in disdainfully. "We can't be friends anymore if you call _that_ coffee. Get rid of it now."

Clint scowled at the billionaire; he was right but Clint wasn't going to admit it. This crappy drink was all he had and he wasn't going to let it go without a fight; and he told the man just as much.

Tony's eyes narrowed and Clint shifted his stance accordingly; the shorter man was going to try something. He was up against a world class SHIELD agent and assassin so he probably wasn't going to achieve anything more than getting his ass whipped, but Clint wasn't going to willingly risk the coffee and he lifted the cup to scull back the rest of the drink.

"This if for your own good, Barton." Tony growled.

It was Clint's only warning and the archer had never seen the other man move so quickly outside of his suit, as when he dove across the kitchen and tackled him to the ground. Tony amazingly got the upper hand and straddled Clint's waist and was able to lock the wrist of the hand not holding the coffee mug in his own and pin it to the tiled floor whilst the other scrabbled for the mug. Clint valiantly tried to stretch his arm away and keep it out of Tony's reach but the billionaire had the leverage and was able to knock the mug out of his hand and send it and the precious liquid across the floor.

"No!" Clint cried in dismay as he watched it slowly spread across the tiles. To his horror he found himself debating the merits of sucking it off the ground and whether or not he was likely to get sick from it. Turning his head back to Tony he noted the smug expression the billionaire had on his face. "I am going to murder you, Stark." He growled out lowly.

The smug smirk slowly slipped of Tony's face at the archer's expression and he released Clint from his grip and slide off of him to sit on the ground. "Hey, hey no need to get hasty now."

"Murder, with lots of screaming and blood and I don't care if JARVIS gets it all on camera because it will be something that I can watch over and over again with grim satisfaction because I killed the person who SPILT MY COFFEE!" he finished with a roar.

Tony yelped and back peddled on his hands and feet until he crashed into the bench and could go no further. Clint dove after him intending rip him to shreds with his bare hands when a Starbucks takeaway coffee mug was thrust into his face. The glorious smell of freshly brewed coffee wafted up from the paper cup and the archer felt himself salivating, his eyes zeroed in on it and he heard himself make a pathetic sounding whimper that he would deny making till the end of time.

"If I give you this, will you not kill Stark?"

"Yes, sure, I promise; now gimmie!" Clint swore as his hand reached out for the coffee. The cup miraculously moved up and away from his outstretched hands and it took Clint a few seconds to realize that there was someone's hand holding it away from him. He tore his eyes away from the cup and followed the hand, up the arm and to the face of the person carrying it. Coulson appeared magically out of his coffee deprived haze and Clint blinked up at him uncomprehendingly. "Why aren't you giving me the coffee?" he asked slowly.

"You're still choking Stark with one hand." Coulson explained slowly. "Release him and you get the coffee."

Clint looked away from Coulson and found that, yes; he was still choking Tony with one hand whilst the other was in the air still reaching for the paper cup. He released his grip on the billionaire's throat and the man let out a wheeze of thanks. Coulson's lips twitched in amusement before he lowered the cup down to within Clint's reach.

The archer snatched the cup out of the agent's hand and skittered across the kitchen floor to the far corner and wrapped both hands protectively around the cup before taking a large mouthful of the glorious beverage.

"You can get up now." Coulson told Tony. "Slowly." He added in warning.

The billionaire nodded weakly before slowly pulling himself to his feet. Clint glared at the man from over his cup and Tony paused. "Did he just _hiss_ at me?" he demanded.

"Let this be a warning to you, Mr. Stark, not to ever get between Hawkeye and his morning caffeine. Even if it is instant."

Tony studied Clint's form curled protectively around his coffee and how he was muttering lowly about it being his 'Precious' and 'Nectar of the Gods' and nodded his head in understanding as he rubbed his bruised throat. He made a mental note to order several new coffee machines and make sure that Clint had at least two in his rooms, just to be safe.

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**AN: BTW for those reading Family Ties, it looks like Thor is going to be jerkish until realising the error of his ways considering that was the way the majority of responses went :P**


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